Today marks the preliminary round
of voting for the 2013 Empire Film Awards. The best thing about these awards is
that it’s all down to the real movie fans of this world, not in the hands of an
Academy. Obviously there are going to be a great many more films that will be
released before voting closes, so this is our opinion as it stands. It would be premature to list The Hobbit and Life of
Pi already given the fact their worthiness still hangs in the balance!
Similarly, the typically award-like films are being with held for later in the
award season. Therefore, a lot could change between this vote now and the Jameson
Empire Awards!

From his explosive debut in Chronicle to his supporting role in Lawless, this young actor is showing that he's far from being type-cast. This is going to be a tough category this year, we also considered Craig Roberts (Submarine, Red Lights, Jane Eyre) but Dane just pips him to the post!

BEST FEMALE NEWCOMER

Elizabeth Olsen

Feel free to disagree with our labelling as 'new'. Although Martha Marcy May Marlene was released last year, it seems like 2013 has really been Elizabeth's year. Despite having few films under her belt, it already felt like her character in Redlights (alongside Cillian Murphy) was too small for her!

BEST SCI/FANTASY

Chronicle

Would not like to be fighting it out in this category this year. With films like The Avengers, Prometheus and Looper it was very hard to pick - but Chronicle was a refreshing take on super powers because the kids become the opposite of super heroes.

BEST COMEDY

American Reunion

Perhaps you have to be a long time American Pie fan to appreciate the sheer nostalgia of this beauty, but it packs many a laugh no matter what. Fingers crossed for many more reunions for Stifler and the gang...

BEST HORROR

The Woman In Black

If anyone votes for the Devil Inside they will get a virtual tap on the wrist... The Woman In Black, however, was a classy remake of a classic play and novel. Plus who doesn't love Daniel Radcliffe?

BEST THRILLER

Contagion

As if the outstanding cast wasn't enough, Steven Soderbergh's disaster movie was laced with doom and anyone who didn't feel scared to touch a door handle after watching Contagion is a very brave person...

JAMESON BEST ACTOR

Tom Hardy

No surprises here then! Just look at Lawless, This Means War, The Dark Knight Rises... This man can act anything! Close contenders for the title were Michael Fassbender (Prometheus, Haywire) and Javier Bardem (Skyfall).

BEST ACTRESS

Jessica Chastain

Gracious and believable in the majority of her films, especially Lawless and Corialanus.

BEST DIRECTOR

Christopher Nolan

Making people choose between Sam Mendes and Christopher Nolan hardly seems far, but any man who managed to round off the Batman Trilogy after the dizzying expectations set by its predecessor deserves the award. Well done Mr Nolan.

BEST BRITISH FILM

Skyfall

How can it not be Skyfall?

BEST FILM

The Dark Knight Rises

With a plot twist to rival all Nolan plot twists and a stellar cast, it's hard not to be excited by this film. Absolute class.

THE ART OF 3D

Avengers Assemble

Outstanding use of 3D by director Joss Whedon, managed to avoid the issues which have plagued 3D in the past. Dark and lacking in detail are not phrases you would use to describe The Avengers

The Inception actor will play Sam Fisher in Ubisoft's film version of the popular video game. Eric Singer is on writing duties. This new comes only a few months after Asassin's Creed was picked up by Regency and Fox. If this is going to be a trend for action movies in the coming years, we can't complain so long as they keep on casting the likes of Michael Fassbender and Tom Hardy.Have your say: good idea or not? And are there any other games you'd like to have the film treatment?

When the Volturi are alerted to the suggestion that Bella
and Edward’s newborn half-breed may in fact be an immortal and dangerous
vampire, the knives are out once again. The final battle commences in a
magnificent fashion.

This is most definitely the strongest film in the Twilight
Saga and a fitting ending to the mammoth franchise. Now that Bella is married
to Edward and finally becomes the vampire she so longed to be, the fabled love triangle
from the past four movies is no more. Thankfully, this means that the hours of
teen angst and moping over Bella’s two eligible males are now long gone. There is
no ‘team Edward’ and ‘team Jacob’: this is Bella’s movie and she very much does
it justice.

The strength of this movie lies within the casting. Our three
leads are now more than comfortable in the roles we have come to know and they
are supported by a refreshing cast of new and brilliant characters. Special
praise to Michael Sheen is in order also, because he is good in this.

It has to be said, this is no technical masterpiece and will
not be winning the awards for visual effects anytime soon. Notably a
suspiciously fake looking baby, which seems unnecessary given the marvellous
hair and makeup on hand without computer graphics. It also lacks some of the realism and freshness of Twlight. However the heart of the piece
remains in the well crafted relationships between the characters: notably Jacob
Black’s bizarre but nicely handled crush on Bella’s young daughter. It’s also nice to
see Bella being more of a bad ass, she no longer sits biting her lip for two
thirds of the movie.

The highlight of the film is the crescendo at the end of the
third act. Refreshingly the director has managed to take creative liberties
with the plot whilst eventually still remaining true to the ending of the saga.
This means that even though you may have read the books, there’s still a
certain amount of a spoiler alert and you will not see it coming! Perhaps it
would be too much of complement to say the moment of revelation is Nolan
worthy, however it is brilliantly inspired and genuinely very clever. It is a
scene that validates the entire saga.

Los Angeles was the place to be on Monday night as all the stars were out for the premiere of the final instalment of the Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2. Scroll down for all the looks from the evening and stay tuned for the London leg of the world tour.
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Like Crazy tells the story of a British college student who
falls in love with an American classmate. They are then separated when she is
banned from the US after overstaying her visa in order to stay with him. A long
distance relationship ensues…

It’s not that this film is bad (on the contrary there are
many lovely aspects of it), but it’s just not particularly good. Independent
romance films aren’t boring; you only need to look at Blue Valentine to see how
it’s done well, but Like Crazy is slightly bland. Felicity Jones and Anton Yelchin
are fine actors, but this leading role where they take up the majority of the
movie is too large a feat. The characters themselves are not striking and they are
never actually introduced so it’s hard to form an audience relationship with
them. All it takes is the arrival of Jennifer Lawrence’s character to show how
much of a difference an actor with a bit more charisma and presence can make to
the film, it is better after she’s introduced.

The photography and the editing are absolutely beautiful; there’s
a naturalistic quality about the way the movie is shot which is refreshing and
charming. But the fact still remains that this is a very slow film, which is
ironically only 90 minutes long.

It’s a simple romance and an ancient dilemma, but sadly this
film never gets chance to really sing.

It's never too early to start speculating about the Academy Awards! Especially after it was announced that Seth MacFarlene is on presenting duties.If you read our post in the summer on the Cannes Film Festival, you'll know that this movie was awarded the Palme d'Or for best film, so it was probably an Oscar prediction back then. Nonetheless, it's now set for a November 16th release nationwide in the UK so in a few weeks opinions will be formulated!

The movie is being shopped as "a film about the extraordinary strength of love." It's directed by Michael Haneke and stars Jean-Louis Trintignant, Emmanuelle Riva and Isabelle Huppert.

Keep an eye out for this at a cinema near you so you can get a head start for Awards Season. Don't know about you, but we're starting to get very excited!

Have your say: Any more obvious predictions or is it too early to say? You know where to comment!